Paper short abstract:

Beyond reporting deportation, the media can serve as agents for the protection of migrants in such situation. This intervention draws lessons from their (actual and neglected) role in the 1960s and 1980s deportation between Ghana and Nigeria.

Paper long abstract:

The media plays an important role in migration and deportation. Through reportage, the media not only brings both phenomenon to the notice of host communities, migrants and other stakeholders, but they can also motivate responses. Yet, little academic work exists on how the media frames migration and deportation. This paper intervenes in this important aspect of migration research by revisiting the deportation of Nigerians from Ghana in 1969 and Ghanaians from Nigeria in 1983. It sets out to achieve two interrelated objectives: (a) assess the coverage of the two deportations in Ghanaian and Nigerian media, and (b) tease out lessons from the actual and neglected roles of the media in the coverage of migrants before, during, and after (i.e. hereafter BD&A) the deportations. To do this, the paper analyses newspaper coverage in Ghana and Nigeria BD&A the deportations and in-depth interviews. The paper concludes by drawing some implications for peace journalism. This paper is part of a broader research project entitled “News media and Nigerians in Ghana: Exploring the Prospects and Challenges of Peace Journalism” funded by the Social Science Research Council’s African Peacebuilding Network (SSRC-APN) Individual Research Grant 2023-2024.